Mentors, Part I: Todd

Before you can understand the impact Todd had on rowing in Cincinnati, you must first understand what the situation was when he was hired. The Cincinnati Rowing Club had masters and juniors, a modest fleet of various boats and was a feature piece of the Cincinnati bicentennial celebration in 1988. The entire riverfront was transformed, with a new "boathouse" at the end. This building had a Montgomery Inn Ribs King restaurant on the top two floors, with the entire basement becoming a training center for rowing. Tanks were installed, thirty ergs were purchased and a full set of Nautilus weight trainers were installed. In theory, one could launch a single from the boathouse, carrying the boat down three stories of stairs to launch off a concrete pad, but there was never rowing out of the building.

My first year was marked by positive experiences as a novice, a few medals, and some great stories. The infamous challenge to Brown University's varsity boat by Josh and our novice 8 happened that year, along with our disqualification for leaving our coxswain's 35 lbs of sand on shore at our head coach's instructions are fodder for later posts. I can't really remember how our varsity boat did that year, other than not being too blown away by their results.

Strange things began happening near the end of the spring. It turns out there were various financial schenagians by the staff, leading to the entire club going bankrupt that summer. The training center was ceded to the city parks and rec commission, along with all the equipment. A group of parents came together to form the Cincinnati Junior Rowing Club. We heard they had gotten together with a rowing booster in the city who had connections all over the east coast. He had hired a new coach, who would join us that fall.

I didn't row that fall. Surprised? I was a band geek. The previous year I had rowed from 3 to 5:30, when my mother would pick me up in the car with dinner and drive me to band practice from 6 to 9. Homework and sleep predictably suffered. I had to choose one that fall, and being a fifth year junior with girlfriend in the color guard, I chose band. Then, near the end of the fall, girlfriend and I broke up for the 675th and final time. I dropped her via a pay phone (remember those?) during lunch while she was home sick with mono. Just to put icing on the cake, I came down with mono exactly one month later, in late November. Laid up until the second week of December, I wasn't cleared to row until the first week of January.

By that time, the team was rowing out of rented, unheated warehouse space far on the north side of town. The city had taken over the training center and was in the middle of a huge renovation following massive flooding that winter. I joined the team halfway through the winter training. When Todd had first talked to them about training, he had said they would "pull hard, every day." That was scary for many, especially when they were told many erg workouts would be an hour long. They got very interested in the training methods after a very good result at a head race that fall. The guys were used to hours by the time I was started very slowly by Todd. 20 minutes, thirty minutes at a time for the first few weeks. His coaching style was different from what I had known. He didn't make a lot of comments through the piece, only once or twice. He just wanted us to put the work in.

Some things became very clear about Todd quickly. First, he had more experience in rowing than anybody we had ever known. He told us stories about wooden boats and days when Cornell was a good crew. (Sorry, couldn't resist.) He told us stories about the days he had coached the Groton School. Second, he really cared about us as people, not just as athletes. When Todd gave a talk about underage drinking, how it affected our training and how sneaking around with such an activity was dishonest and didn't belong in rowing, a group of high school seniors and juniors actually listened. And did what he asked: no booze once we went on the water. We didn't do this because we were scared of him, we did it because he respected us and talked about it like we were adults, not kids.

Third, it was obvious that Todd was and still is totally nuts. The guy hated losing, always wanted to win and loved a great joke. April 1st seems to be his favorite day of the year. He wasn't a coach, he was a grandfather, shepherding around a bunch of grandsons he had taught to pull really hard and win races by huge margins. And the margins were big, and getting bigger.

There were only 11 guys rowing in Cincinnati that spring. One raced a single for his private school. Two seniors with us weren't as serious as the rest and Todd put them in a double. Our 8 selection was mainly him trying out different lineups behind one of two strokes. By April, the boat was set. We won Midwest that year in the 8 and the 4 in such undramatic fashion that Todd seemed a little disappointed in our lack of enthusiasm. He told us we should stay rowing until late July and go to USRowing Nationals, where we won as well.

Think about that. 8 of the 11 boys rowing in Cincinnati, all in their second year, won USRowing Nationals. Even some of the jocks at my football-mad high school heard about it the next fall and congratulated me for being a national champion. What the heck had this man done?

He had been fanatical about his crew. He cared about us, just like a parent. He pushed, praised asked for more and never made you feel bad if you fell short. He chided, lectured and glared when we did something stupid that we should have known better. He joked with us. He quoted Shakespeare to us, taught us how to visualize a race and knew just how to taper his crew. He cried when we won.

I learned that I must be that lunatic about my crews. A coach must respect his athletes and truly care about what happens to them long after the last race is complete, or those athletes might never totally trust the coach. As everyone knows, trust is central to the sport of rowing, between the athlete and him/herself, between the members of the crew and between the boat and the coach.

Todd taught me to trust that athletes are resilient and can handle a workload most people don't think is possible. They thrive when presented with such a challenge. He watched us carefully, charted our distances and constantly asked us how we felt. His mental preparation was always great, something that I still need to work on as a coach. He demonstrated the benefits of experience and patience.

Many of my on-water workouts are from that period of my life. I can't for the life of me describe how he talked to us on the water or what he would say about technique. It was always about pulling hard and together. On the water, it was about making the boat set up and sing, waiting for his reaction from the launch.

Basically, we would have rowed over a dam if he had told us. Great coaches have that sort of relationship with their crews. His crews are never the biggest, usually don't row the "prettiest" and they don't act like a bunch of military school cadets. But where he goes, there is victory.

Categories: Coaching, Tribute, Rowing, Personal